What The Cast Of M3GAN Has Said About The Horror Movie
M3GAN is here to be "your new best friend," and we are already terrified.M3GAN is directed by Housebound's Gerard Johnstone, with Blumhouse's Jason Blum and Saw and Annabelle director James Wan serving as producers.It is likely you have already seen and heard of M3GAN after the doll went viral on Twitter last year. A host of users reposted clips of the doll dancing, making it one of the most anticipated horror movies of 2023.The movie follows a brilliant roboticist at a toy company who uses artificial intelligence to develop the Model 3 Generative Android (M3GAN), a life-like doll programmed to be a child's greatest companion and a parent's greatest ally.James Wan has described the film as "Annabelle meets The Terminator," but what else has the cast of M3GAN said about this movie?
8 Allison William's Status As A Mom Changes The Film For Her
Allison Williams, who starred in Get Out, worked as an executive producer on the horror movie. She has spoken about how her status as a mother changed how she handled making the film.
“I became a mom, and that made it all much more interesting, because that’s Gemma’s whole arc,” she told Town & Country. When the film starts, Gemma has zero children. Then she has two, “one that she created from scratch and the other that she inherited, who, while sharing her DNA, is not her own. That was going to be complicated, but it also became more interesting as a performer to bring this person to life, having a greater appreciation of the stakes of that.”
7 Creators Of M3GAN Didn't Expect The Dance To Go Viral
Allison Williams told Entertainment Weekly in December 2022 that the creators didn’t expect the M3GAN dance to become such a huge internet sensation.
“We had internally come up with memes to distribute, but we didn’t end up needing to deploy them, because people started making their own,” the Girls actress explained. “You can’t even dream that big when you’re doing something like this. That was just such an exciting day. It was proof of concept.”
The New Zealand-born director Johnstone added, “The whole point of the Brandon scene was to [show] you can give M3GAN all these things you don’t want to do, but you can also give her things you can’t do, like clip a kid behind the ear if he’s being mean to your kid. So we take that to the nth degree with M3GAN.”
He continued, “It was one of those crazy, sleep-deprived, 3 a.m. thoughts. Wouldn’t it kind of be funny if the soundtrack suddenly became real and M3GAN ended up busting a move to whatever music was playing. It was just something that everyone embraced and loved.” People loved it so much they were dressing as the doll for Halloween, months before it was released in the cinema.
6 Who Would Win In A Fight: Annabelle Or M3GAN?
It's not a surprise that M3GAN and Annabelle are being compared as both are chilling dolls who James Wan has helped bring to life. So who would win if both of the dolls faced off?
James Wan answered the question, "Listen, M3GAN is a whole new breed that we haven't seen before. I wouldn't put it past M3GAN to have great tricks up her sleeves, especially if we're lucky enough to have future stories. Why can't M3GAN have rocket launchers at her fingertips? That would be amazing. It would blow any doll off the planet."
Allison Williams who plays the doll's creator answered, "I wouldn't ever bet against M3GAN. Ever, ever. I've got to go with my girl. She has the worldwide web in her being. She could win anything."
5 What Creating M3GAN Was Like
It must have been an odd experience to act in the same space as a character like M3GAN.
"I really don't want to ruin the magic for people of what M3GAN is. But it was a challenge, I will put it that way. Of all the costars I've ever had, all of whom have been lovely, she was by far the most temperamental and challenging," Alison Williams explained.
"But I will say that kind of effort literally took every department working together. And that's the stuff that just brings a crew together and makes an experience really special from a meta standpoint. From an acting standpoint, if you're looking for an uncanny experience, it's very easy to perform against. It just rolls off the tongue."
4 M3GAN Is Played By A Dancer
M3GAN’s body is played by actor Amie Donald, a professional dancer and actor.
“Dancing very much helps because you need balance as a robot. Robots, you don’t see them wobbling around or doing human stuff, so control and waiting around are two things that are very important that come from dance that I can use in acting,” New Zealand-born Donald told The Movie Times in December 2022.
She also explained how that viral dance was created: “The preparation we have to do for this is my dance teacher, Kylie Norris, choreographed a little dance, and then we had Luke and Jed, they also helped with all of the movements, making sure it was right. We also had this piece of music that we did it to, and it was absolutely so fun to do.”
She also revealed her favorite part of playing the creepy doll. “M3GAN, she is a robot/doll, and she’s actually just made to protect Cady. And then she starts getting a little too overprotective of Cady and everything that’s around her, so if she thinks that anything has happened with Cady and someone is being mean to her and made her cry or made her upset, she thinks that the best way is to just wipe them out,” she explained.
3 Who Is M3GAN Based On?
When the viral trailer dropped, many fans questioned if the doll was based on Elizabeth Olsen. The creators have shut down the idea that the horror lead is based on the Wandavision star.
"That’s so funny," Allison Williams said, when asked. "As I started seeing sketches of her, I kept seeing different people and she's looked the same for many iterations of her even before we started filming."
"At one point, I thought she looked a lot like Juno Temple. I haven't thought of Elizabeth Olsen or the Olsen twins before but now I totally see it," the Girls actress replied.
Williams went on to explain, "I think you kind of project what you project onto her. She's enough of a blank slate that you sort of see different faces in there, but I love hearing who people think she looks like."
"Even if we had said she's going to look like Elizabeth Olsen, once the team in charge of making her then 2d conceptualized her, made her into 3d, and then manufactured her and put silicone on – all these little incremental changes completely change the way she looks," Johnstone told revealed to Unilad.
The director did reveal that the creative team didn't have the actress in mind when creating the killer doll, but they did have a particular look in mind that they wanted to achieve. "Whenever you see those European dolls that are just super lifelike, they're the creepiest and so that was really what we set out to do."
2 M3GAN's Iconic Dance Almost Wasn't Included In The Trailer
During a recent interview with The Hollywood Reporter, Allison Williams reveals how they decided to place the scene in the trailer. "The first time I saw it was when Amie [Donald] was practicing the dance, and then I watched her film it. I wasn't in the scene that day, but I went to set because I knew she was filming it and I wanted to be there. And it was just extraordinary," Williams told the publication.
"Watching the performance of it, in and of itself, was unbelievable, and by then, we were all very, very familiar with Amie's brilliance as a performer. But it wasn't until I saw it fully edited into the movie, in its context, with the song, with everything, that I was like, 'Oh, this is iconic.' And then, when we saw the first cut of the trailer, we were all hemming and hawing about whether or not to let the dance be out in the trailer or try to keep it as a surprise in the movie."
Williams has admitted that they were right to put it in the trailer as nothing else" helps convey who she is more quickly than knowing that she's a doll who's going to stop and do a choreographed dance and then pick up a murder weapon and go on her way."
"That bizarre, off-kilter, hilarious freakishness is exactly what we were going for, and so it really was a perfect illustration of where we wanted to be," she reveals, giving audiences a hint of what to expect soon.
1 Violet McGraw Wants A M3GAN Doll Of Her Own
"I loved to play with dolls. I liked to play with the American Girl dolls a lot, because me and my sister got a bunch of set," 11-year-old Violet McGraw told Variety.
When asked what her favorite part of filming the movie is, "I just love the dance. It’s so iconic. That was really cool to watch."
The young actress who plays Cady connected with her character. "I think I would also get really attached to M3GAN as well, because I’d think of her as my best friend and a sister to me. I feel like that’s how we can relate a lot."
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